Tag: Donald Trump

How Not To Respond To The Prodigal Son

What do you say to a Democrat who says

“This isn’t fair! I worked hard to be honest and caring to my fellow man. I was active trying to get laws passed that would benefit humanity, thinking it would eventually get me elected as President of the United States. Then Trump comes along, insults everyone he can think of, gropes women, thinks only of himself, offers nothing but lie after lie in a blatant effort to tell people whatever he thinks they wanted to hear. He doesn’t even try to hide his ignorant, hateful, and self-centered ways. Yet there he is, now working out of the oval office. Why did I waste my whole life being so good?”

This is not a new problem, with precedents going back thousands of years.   There are even a couple of cases in the Bible that may shed light on this situation.

The Prodigal Son

This story D is about a father and his two grown sons. One day the younger son asks for his inheritance. The father relents. That son takes off and squanders his new assets on drink and parties.   He falls on hard times. Eventually, he realizes that even his father’s servants are better off than he is. He comes to his senses, and returns to his father’s house begging for forgiveness.   The father is thrilled to see him back and throws a party.  

Most sermons focus on this part of the story. One of my preachers, however, went on to discuss the ‘good’ older son. He remained with the father and looked after the farm while the younger son was away.   Like the Democrat mentioned above, the older son wasn’t so happy that the father threw a party for the errant son and not him, since he was the one who did all the work.

A Deathbed Conversion

Then there is the issue of ‘deathbed conversions’. This is where a long-time sinner repents just before s/he dies. In the earliest case, mentioned in Luke 23:39–43, a lifetime thief being crucified on a cross next to Jesus’ asked to be remembered when Jesus gets to his kingdom. Jesus agrees. But if you were to Google “deathbed conversion” you would find plenty of articles questioning the existence of a genuine last-minute change of heart.

I, for one, can appreciate a little skepticism. But as Reverend Billy Graham points out in www.christianpost.com, God is a lot harder to fool than many christians give him credit for, and much less predictable. The doubting “christians” whose complaint follows the same reasoning as our first Democrat mentioned above may be telling us more about what’s in their heart than the heart of the convert, as I discussed in “It’s The Light”.

How I See It

Those people who complain about having missed opportunities to be jerks simply don’t understand the concept and are not good Democrats, or christians, or just regular people, as the case may be. If you don’t see the benefits of improving the lot of your fellow wo/man as well as yourself or if you don’t really believe that honesty and fairness make for happier people in both the short and long run than debauchery or ass-holiness do, then you are just another fraud. You are no better than those who you are complaining about.   It’s that simple.

I apologize for the lack of diversity of my examples. Both are from the New Testament of the Bible.  I didn’t remember anything pertinent from Greek mythology (I did find plenty of life lessons in those stories while in school even though their gods had even more flaws than our current President), and there are plenty of other realms and resources about which I know nothing.   If you have better references for this issue, I would be glad to hear them.   I would even accept counterexamples.

For another example of cluelessness, see my blog post Another Clueless “Christian”? As to the matter of forgiveness, the questions I posed in What I Still Don’t Know About Forgiveness have yet to be resolved.

My Last Thoughts On Our Last Election

Well, the people have spoken!   And I’m really disappointed. I’ve previously expressed my displeasure with some of Mr. Trump’s positions and rhetoricB1, B2, B3, but my main complaint has always been his severe lack of maturity, his complete disregard for the truth,

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Candidate Truthfulness
Candidate Truthfulness

as read in the International Business Times.


and his extremely low ethical standards. That allows him to push the buttons of idiots and fan the flames of bigotry for his own personal gain, which he regularly puts ahead of whatever action might be better for the good of the country.   Trying to understand why he was so popular, I listened to a lot of people, but found their arguments lacking in both fact

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For an article on the pervasivenessD of fake news, see Fake news: How a partying Macedonian teen earns thousands publishing lies. For a discussion of the truth in “news” and even Ben Franklin’s words on the subject, see Fair Play in a Fact-Challenged Political Landscape. This is why my blog post How We Lose Our Grip On Reality was important. The sad part for me was that some of the claims cited as justification of a Trump fanatic’s position were too blatantly false to need any rigorous fact-checking effort.


and logic.   Examples include those who insisted Clinton just couldn’t be trusted (in light of the above). And there’s the gentleman who praised Trump’s lack of political experience and then 30 seconds later bashed Obama for the same characteristic.   It makes me wonder if my concerns for “Falling Into A Negative Spiral” have all come true.

But you won’t find me out protesting, because I don’t see the point to it. I understood the rules before the election (See Article II and the Twelfth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States). I thought they were as good as you’re likely to find anywhere.

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There is that one question about the fairness of the Electoral College and whether it has outlived its usefulness (which in today’s world I believe it has). But because in all cases where the Electoral College differed from the popular vote, the Democratic (or pre-Democratic) candidate lost the electionA as they appear to have done this year, I don’t see any serious efforts to change that process any time soon.

Some argue that the Electoral College was intended to favor smaller states. Certainly our founders pondered the issue of individual power vs. state power. That’s why the Senate gives states equality while the House of Representative tips the scale toward the individual. Personally, I like the notion of ‘one person, one vote’ without taking a penalty if you can actually wave to your neighbor from the front porch.


The news that many of the protesters didn’t vote was also disturbing. I’ve long maintained that if you don’t vote you waive all rights to complain about the election for the next four years.

A Growing Frustration

It has been said that Mr. Trump was able to tap into America’s growing frustration with the gridlock in Washington.   I can definitely understand such a frustration.   The problem is that for a majority of Americans, that frustration was self-inflicted.   I’m talking about the majority who four years ago voted for candidates specifically because those candidates promised to rip the word “compromise” from their dictionary and vehemently oppose every move the opposition makes (even if it was originally their idea).  

As one might expect, their candidates had some success. Now this majority is complaining that nothing gets done in Washington.   Really?   To me, that is strong evidence of the negative spiral I was concerned about.

I predict in four years these short-sighted people with shorter memories will be even more frustrated. They will make even more desperate decisions, speeding the downward spiral even more.   To see a discussion of one type of desperate decision-making and how to stop it, see my recent post When Sailors Should Split Tacks.   Sadly enough, like the skipper in that post, these people are incapable of recognizing their faulty logic or seeing their own part in this mess.   But as long as they have someone else to blame for their problems, I don’t expect to see much growth.  

I’ve always liked to believe that whatever the results of an election, the people got what they deserve. But the truth is that the minority gets to suffer right alongside everyone else.   Those who took the right steps to make America great over the last decade also have reason to be frustrated.   Their frustration will be greater in another four years also, but they know that just waiting for others to mature won’t get the change they are looking for.   That knowledge alone does not make the frustration any less. But they have to be mature enough to deal with it while they bide their time waiting for the next opportunity for improvement.

Wait And See

So that is what I’m doing.   Mr. Trump isn’t President yet so there is really nothing yet to complain about.   His lack of truthfulness, that characteristic that was the most bothersome during the campaign, is now the one thing that gives me the most hope in a strange way. If he only screws up one out of twelve of the things he promised to screw up, we should probably consider ourselves lucky.  

Just hours after the election Mr. Trump praised Mrs. Clinton for her many virtues. This was 180 degrees off from everything he had said before then. (English translation: “I’ve been feeding you all a line of cr@_ all this time.   Thanks for your vote”).   How many of his promises has he already walked away from, just weeks after the election?   There is the distinct possibility that some things could actually turn out reasonably well.   But there is still plenty of damage that can be done.  

We need to bide our time and look for opportunities for growth.   To break the spiral, one thing I’d like to see is a strong, long-term commitment to education – an education that includes and even emphasizes critical thinking skills.   And as always, I’ll be doing my part to put things into perspective and combat “conventional” wisdom while promoting uncommon sense.   Thank you for listening.

A Spokesperson For Hillary Clinton

I think Secretary Clinton could find somebody like Clara Peller (August 4, 1902 – August 11, 1987)A to go to all of Donald Trump’s events. She could have been in the front row at the last debate, and then whenever Mr. Trump failed to answer a question (which I believe was every time except the last question (I’ll leave the fact-checking to somebody else – I don’t think I could sit through that debate one more time)), or when Mr. Trump interrupted Ms. Clinton (which only happened 18 times, down from the 51 times he interrupted her in the first debateA), this Peller doppelgängerD would interrupt Mr. Trump with her signature line, “Where’s the beef?”  I don’t believe Donald would even realize that she is questioning the lack of substance in his conversation or in his Presidential policies; with his adolescent “locker room” mentality, Mr. Trump would assume this old woman was referring to one of his male body parts, and he would feel deeply offended.  And then as Mr. Trump walked by at the end of the event, this lady could assume an open, gropeable stance, with her arms outstretched, and maybe her lips all puckered up and ready.  She could wind up  becoming Donald’s worst nightmare.

For Trump’s other events, you would probably need a corps of such old lady hecklers, because each one would find herself uninvited after her first appearance.  In fact, they would probably need to go in groups or be escorted, because Donald’s rabid fans would not be above “taking them out”.  Donald himself is more likely to launch into a tirade, followed up at three o’clock the next morning with a volley of angry tweets.

Mrs. Clinton would probably take the advice of Michelle Obama, rather than mine.  I understand.  I’ve never believed that the victor in a race to the bottom could really be called a winner, anyway (What was the prize for the first man to get to Hell?).  But a representative like Clara could put Donald Trump’s tactics into better perspective, and would be entertaining.

A Better Plan For Controlling Gun Violence?

Well, here we are again with another mass shooting in AmericaA, this time in Orlando, Florida.  This is the first such catastrophe since my last post on the subjectA six months ago, which followed a string of almost one mass shooting a month over the six month period before that.  And still no solution.  I saw a clever suggestion on Facebook, where some gentleman invoked the same rhetoric that Donald Trump used in his plan to ban all Muslims to call for a ban on all assault weapons and weapons of mass destruction only until the United States was able to get a handle on dealing with crazy people and began educating our children again (which were cited in that Facebook discussion as reasons for the rampage).  Strangely enough, this idea didn’t seem to be as popular as Trump’s.  We’ve also seen the difficulty in passing a law preventing people on the “No Fly” list from getting a gunA – something that most people consider sensible.

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The Atlantic has a nice articleA explaining how that idea has made hypocrites out of both political parties.
  Based on the comments and arguments I’ve read on this issue, I’ve come up with what may be the only workable solution.

Plan B

Since we will apparently never agree to restrict the ownership of firearms in any way (even though we have no problem regulating less dangerous products), we need to institute some sort of bag limits.  I am in favor of lifetime limits rather than seasonal limits.  There is still some debate on whether the limit on family members should be higher or lower than the limit on innocent strangers (the definition of “innocent” can be worked out later if it is even relevant to this discussion).  To get the ball rolling, I’ll throw out a few numbers that we can iron out in the comment section.  I propose a lifetime limit of one adult white male per person (some restrictions may apply) regardless of the number of guns owned.  Since up to now, damages for such offenses typically considered the earning power of the victim (which never seemed right to me), the bag limit for females should be about 1.5 (I’m not quite sure how to deal with round-off error; maybe we could start at two, but drop the limit to one if you’ve already met your male limit).  The limit on Muslims would, of course, be three (we need to keep the limit for any one incident below four so we don’t trigger the commonly used definition of a mass shooting, and can therefore look better than the French).  Since Jews are still the most persecuted religious group in AmericaA, we’ll set their limit at two.  As usual, there will be no limit on black males, except for overzealous law enforcement agencies.

If we follow this plan, the mass-shooting statistics are guaranteed to go down.  But if the overall gun violence statistics increase intolerably we could either go to a lottery system or increase the permit fees.  (As the fees for especially popular groups start to increase, we may need to find a way to control poaching.  We can worry about that later.)  Both of these solutions have been successful with other game.  If the fees are high enough, we could lower other taxes.  I would start with the taxes devoted to education, since I suspect that those most likely to object to this plan may have some level of intelligence.  We could export the catch to China and convince them it’s more humane than the dog meat they are now using.  If we corner the market for this resource, that too would increase tax revenue.

Did I forget anything?  I realize that this solution may not pass the test for political correctness, but based on some of the feedback I saw in the Facebook discussion, that alone could make the plan more attractive to some people.

What do you think?  If you have a more workable plan, let’s hear it.  If, on the other hand, your plan depends on Hell freezing over, you might as well keep it to yourself.

 

Another Clueless “Christian”?

Not long ago, on the Facebook page of an acquaintance, a discussion was brewing about the Pope having the audacity to say Donald Trump was not a Christian.

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I won’t give you a link to the Facebook discussion, but here’s a New York Times article describing the Pope’s remarksA.
One person suggested the Ten Commandments were the true litmus testD of Christianity.  This week I read that The Donald’s favorite Bible verse is “an eye for an eye”A. There seems to be some sort of misunderstanding here. Were this a characteristic peculiar to Trump supporters I would probably have let it slide, but I’m concerned that it is indicative of a growing segment of the population who call themselves Christians, but are clearly clueless about the concept.

My Background

I don’t  consider myself any sort of theology expert.  I’ve even been rumored to have nodded off in the middle of a sermon or two, and am not even guaranteed to come to the same conclusions as our pastor when reading any particular passage.  On each of the few occasions I actually tried reading the Bible cover-to-cover, I was becalmed in one of the begat sections.

Although I’m not a Catholic, I have been impressed with the latest Pope; he didn’t just memorize verses, he actually seems to understand a Biblical concept or two.  In fact, he is so different in my view from his predecessors that I’m amazed he was actually elected (maybe it was Divine Intervention).

The point is you shouldn’t take my word for any of this.  Maybe you should just read the Book.  I’ll give references when I can.  But just beware the begats.

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OK, if you must know, you can find some of them at Genesis 5:1 to end, Genesis 11:10 to end, Genesis 36:1 to end, . . . , Matthew 1:2 through 17, Luke 3:23 to end. This list is not exhaustive. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.

Bible Background

The way I understand it, the Bible has two parts; the first, called “The Old Testament” could be considered the prequel.  It includes the Jewish (who would prefer not to be called Christian) Torah, their most important text, and spans the period from the creation of the universe (now referred to as the “Big Bang”) up to, but not including the birth of Christ (from which the word “Christian” is derived), a.k.a. Jesus, a.k.a. all kinds of other titles. The New Testament is His story.

The Ten Commandments are in the Torah and therefore are in the Old Testament (Exodus 20:1–17D and then again in Deuteronomy 5:4–21D).  “An eye for an eye” has an even longer history. According to Wikipedia, the principle of “an eye for an eye” goes back to Babylonian LawA, where it was actually an attempt to limit any retaliation so that it wasn’t worse than the original offense.  In English, that means it represents the maximum allowed punishment, not the minimum required punishment (although that interpretation does not seem apparent to me in the language of the Bible).   The rule is repeated three times in the Old Testament (Exodus 21:24D, Leviticus 24:20D, Deuteronomy 19:21D).

The Problem

As I hinted before, the Old Testament does not define Christianity.  Christ (also known as Jesus) defines Christianity.  The Old Testament repeats principles that are shared with half of the (non-Christian) population of the middle east.  But we are in luck; Jesus did specifically address the “eye for an eye” idea.  In Matthew 5:38 through 42, He clearly states

“38 “You have heard that it was said, ‘An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.’ 39 But I tell you not to resist an evildoer. On the contrary, whoever slaps you on the right cheek, turn the other to him as well. 40 If anyone wants to sue you and take your shirt, let him have your coat as well. 41 And if anyone forces you to go one mile, go two with him. 42 Give to the person who asks you for something, and do not turn away from the person who wants to borrow something from you.”

(Is this where the Pope got his Communist streakA?)

But What Did Allah Say?

Since the “eye for an eye” idea seemed to be so pervasive, I decided to check one more reference: the Quran.   As far as I can tell, it is only mentioned once:

“And We wrote for them in it: a life for a life, an eye for an eye, a nose for a nose, an ear for an ear, a tooth for a tooth, and an equal wound for a wound; but whoever forgoes it in charity, it will serve as atonement for him. Those who do not rule according to what God revealed are the evildoers.”

I think this mirrors the sentiments of Jesus.  While doing research, I found another interesting story that may support this view:

“A man came to the Messenger of Allah with the killer of his relative.
The Prophet said: Pardon him.
But the man refused.
The Prophet said: Take the blood money.
But the man refused.
The Prophet said: Go and kill him, for you are like him.
So the man pardoned the criminal.”

Conclusions?

You can’t have your cake and eat it too.  If you are not going to follow the teachings of Jesus (the Communist), then you can’t continue to call yourself a Christian.

Sometimes I come away from an issue with more questions than answers.  In this case I’m wondering what Mr. Trump is really trying to say:

Is he, like the Babylonians, citing this rule as an upper limit on our retaliation?  And recognizing that since September 11, 2001 we have killed far more Muslims (over 100,000 in Iraq alone) than we lost in those terrorist attacks (under 3,000) and the Iraq war (around 4,400) combined,  is he suggesting we should end our war on terror?

Is the real reason he wants to bar Muslims from coming to America is that they make him look barbaric?

By quoting the Quran, I am not endorsing Islam; nor do I have any intention of converting to Islam.  For many of you “Christians”, however, it sounds like it might be a step up.

Flying Their True Colours

I saw an interesting sight the other afternoon.  While driving along US-1 in an urban area of very South Florida I noticed a large white pickup truck with large tires (the type of vehicle that, with or without a gun rack, would be attributed around here as being owned and operated by rednecks, or should I say white males with plenty of Southern Pride).  Waving proudly in the back was a very large American flag.

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By “American” I specifically mean The United States Of America, not any of those other North American countries who’s inhabitants, if you’ve been listening intently to Donald Trump lately, are almost all scumbagsA. (But don’t worry, scumbags, if you are willing to work for the Donald for next-to-nothing, I’m sure he will still like you – unless you are capturedA (by immigration perhaps).


Although I’ve recently expressed my view on the display of the Confederate flag, the flag that one is most likely to see in these parts would be the flag of our nearest Latin American neighbors (you’d better check the map; around here that wouldn’t be Mexico).  As it turns out, when you are as far south as you can possibly get inside the continental limits of the United States, the traditional southern white folk no longer represent the Majority.   That title was seized several decades ago by Cubans displaced by a communist regime at home.

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I realize the term “communist” or its significance in this instance may cause confusion.   When I was young (which is probably long before your time), we were taught that communism was very, very bad.   Many Cubans came here during that era.   But as we’ve learned from the Chinese experience, one’s political circumstances aren’t really all that important as long as one is willing to work for next-to-nothing.   Just ask the Donald.   Then you can be our buddy (sorry, I mean BFF).   In fact, to avoid offending our BFFs, we don’t even use the word “communist” anymore unless we are talking about our political opponents (of just about any flavor) or the PopeA.   So apparently, their government still won’t allow the people in Cuba to work for Americans for next-to-nothing. And those that moved here wouldn’t think of doing that either.   So there is a lot of hostility between the Cuban residents of the two countries, even now as our President tries to restore relations, just as his (Republican) predecessors have done with milder, less oppressive or objectionable countries like Russia and China.


What really pissed off the locals as this power shift was taking place was that the newcomers weren’t assimilating the local culture.   They weren’t bothering to learn English. They weren’t renouncing the corruption or other values of a third-world country. And maybe most important, they kept waving that damn Cuban flag.   This has been going on for over fifty years now.   If the local Cubans had assimilated, then they would have known that the flag they should have been waving was from a group that actually attacked and declared war on the United States to preserve their enlightened principles under the guise of “state rights”. Only after a long, devastating struggle was that group soundly defeated and erased from existence over 150 years ago.

Anyway, when I saw the American flag in the back of the pickup truck, I know it wasn’t that big a deal, but I found it refreshing.   Maybe that guy finally found something he could be proud of.

Lately the only ones you normally see flying the American flag, the largest they can possibly find, are used car dealerships.   And how many times have you heard on the news about the veteran who tried flying his flag, but was denied or thrown out by his condominium association. The condo association was exercising the same rights to protect their residents from offensive material that the vet had fought so hard to protect (and that some of his friends no doubt died for).   But this is America, after all.   It almost brought tears to my eyes.

DIn the time several centuries ago when the British Navy ruled the seas, “colours” meant “flag”.

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